1.25.2005

They call me Moneybags.

It's apparently stocks and RRSPs season. I never really knew such a season existed, and I have the feeling that it was just invented this year and everyone is playing along. You know, like those who fronted like they knew Bruce Willis was a ghost even though they thought he was just plain old alive Bruce Willis like the rest of us did.

I wonder what it was like when Christmas first began its life as a yearly phenomenon. Were there groups of bandwagoners hanging by the wayside like, "Christmas? Shiiit. I been celebratin Christmas since dude was BORN, yo. Before that. Holla!"

Of course it's possible that I'm just totally clueless. You know, what with me being totally clueless and all. I don't even know what an RRSP is, much less how to get one, why I should get one, and why this is the best time of the year to get one. I don't even know if they come in ones, or if I should get them in bundles of ten. "Gimmie a dime of that good RRSP shit, mang."

We got our stock plans in today, and Julie was waving it in my face like I just got my acceptance letter to Harvard. Catherine's panties got all wet after opening hers, something like when my girlfriend sees a new episode of Alias, or when my dog finds leftover bits of food in her feces. Like every other year before, I shoved the giant envelope in my bag, unopened, destined to be thrown in a sock drawer at home and not thought about again until this time next year.

Cat, however, a dolphin with kidney stones, kept bouncing up and down, squealing. I eventually bit and asked her what's up, and she went on and on about something or other. I stared at her for awhile, and then interrupted, "like, you live in a totally different world than I do, don't you? Just two different realities. Really. I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about." Like everyone else when talking about money, she laughed at my ignorance and gave me the look that most people give to babies when they try to sit upright and fall on their face.

I asked for her to explain it all to me, and her eyes lit up, like mine do when someone tells me Jessica Alba is in a new comic adaptation and the pics can be found here: (insert website url). She broke it all down, drawing graphs and timelines on a napkin, using a little circle with an arrow through it that apparently reprsented me. I didn't have the heart to tell her I still had no idea what the fuck she was talking about. Either that, or I didn't want to look stupid. I'll let you decide.

Instead, I passed the time by every once in awhile raising my eyebrows and nodding my head, much like I used to in Mr. Sebetti's physics class. I noticed that if I asked questions here and there like, "so what does that mean?" or "you mean that's money I have just sitting there?" and "wow! free money??", that with every high-pitched question mark her eyes would light up and she'd get a little more excited. It's the closest experience I've had in real life to a person's eyes turning to dollar signs. If you knew what Cat looks like, you'd know that this only made her look like a villain on Chip 'n' Dale: Rescue Rangers. (Catherine plush toys, now available at Walmart.)

She then dismissed me with a wave and a "you're all anti-corporate anyways, aren't you?" I laughed, though I'm still not sure why.

Coming home, I found an article in today's paper, the ID section, with the sub-header: "Sick of getting financial advice from people you wish would stick a sock it? ID offers help." After picturing sticking socks in Catherine's mouth, I found this to be a bit harsh. But still, it was good to see that I wasn't the only one out of the financial planning loop.

Sadly, the article was actually a How-To Guide, a wolf in sheep's clothing, full of jargon and codewords the author assumed I'd be able to decipher. It now sits in my sock drawer with my unopened stock plan envelope, and I promise to read them both in depth. One day.

I turned on the television, and a news anchor promised me that later tonight she would tell me all the ins-and-outs of RRSPs. But by this point I was more than suspicious of anyone who promised me such easy knowledge.

Instead, I changed to Spongebob Squarepants, and tittered myself to sleep, where I'm pretty sure I didn't accumlate any wealth, but then again, who knows. If money can be made out of nowhere, I figure sleeping during Spongebob is as good a place as any to start.

peace.

1.24.2005

It Happened Twice!

Imagine the creepiest physical feeling your body could ever endure.

OK?

Well, fuck that, I win. Twice.

Today was the second time this week that I was sitting on my chair, minding my own business, surfing a little net, chatting a little MSN, when I shifted my legs and realized that my ball sack had fallen asleep.

And it's horrible enough when your leg or your arm falls asleep, and you're paralyzed as the blood rushes back into your limbs in tiny spurts of pain. But that's nothing compared to feeling the ol' pins n' needles in your scrotal region.

I was both horrified and amazed, laughing out loud to myself and grimacing in odd pain. I'm not sure if I'm the first to experience such a sensation, but, like a boy touched for the first very first time...I feel kinda special nontheless.

Aaaaand, that commences my creepiest blog ever. Next to the one I never wrote about the girl in that Lemony Snickett movie. But hey. Let's not go there.

peace.

1.23.2005

Okayplayer made my day twice in a row

Word.

peace.

1.22.2005

On Your Hot 97, Everyday, That's My Word

That's a Puffy lyric, and it's just taken on a whole new meaning to me. HOT 97, I'm on your ass, everyday, and that's MY word.

For those who don't know, HOT 97 is (or rather was, thanks to 107) New York's premiere hiphop station. For years their slogan was "where hiphop lives", and there was little to debunk that claim.

Recently, perhaps in a ratings grab, their morning show has been running a spoof of the "We Are The World" song called "The Tsunami Song". Along with lyrics mocking the victims, the song also repeatedly refers to those affected by the tragedy as "chinks".

I don't have to tell how wrong this is, and, me being an Asian hip-hop head (and I rep both pretty hard), I don't have to tell you how hurt I was and how pissed the fuck off I currently am.

First off, a HUGE thank you to the people over at Okayplayer.com. I have been lurking and posting on that board for years now, and when I first heard of this news I wasn't sure where to direct my anger. Thanks to okayplayers for doing it for me. Their response was swift, compassionate, angry, and appropriate. Thank you okayplayer, for ensuring I didn't slip off into the dark side by losing faith in hiphop, black folk, Americans, and humanity in general. That would have just made me one of the bad guys. We "angry" folk are always at the risk of becoming our own enemies. You checked me on that one, and you forever have my gratitude for it. Seriously, you had me tearing up over here.

To see how it went down at the boards, hit:

The Initial Response
After the "Apology"

There, you will also find links to the songs and their disgusting lyrics, as well as the contact info for everyone you could ever possibly want to yell at about this.

Here is the e-mail I sent out this morning to HOT 97's parent company:

To Whom it May Concern,

As you are probably aware of by now, the radio station HOT 97 has been running a horribly offensive and blatantly racist song during their morning programming called "The Tsunami Song". Besides making light of the recent tragedies, the song repeatedly refers to victims as "chinks".

As both an Asian and a hip-hop fan, I am so hurt and offended I am not sure how to respond. But I am also aware that I probably don't have to explain to you how this song is so wrong on all levels.

I realize that the folks at HOT 97 are using this song in full knowledge of its offensive content, perhaps to draw controversy and therefore ratings.

And since they are looking for outrage, it leaves one in a Catch 22 when one is looking to protest and voice discontent.

It is because of this that I am not e-mailing HOT 97. I am e-mailing you, their parent company, with this plea:

PLEASE STOP THEM. Please tear this song from the airways, please reprimand the offending parties in the appropriate manner, please ensure that a proper on-air apology is made and given a heavy rotation every morning, just as the tsunami song was given.

I realize that HOT 97 has already issued an apology, but please notice that the apology is impersonal, weak, and doesn't even begin to address what is wrong with what they did. The apology issued only concerns itself with the tragedy and doesn't even recognize the hurtful RACISM in the song's lyrics.

They hope to buy their forgiveness with a week's worth salary going to the tsunami victims. Please, don't let these people get off so easily. Don't let them think this is about money. Don't let them think it's just about the tsunami, and not about Asians and even human beings in general. Don't let them insult us all further with this weak apology.

Thank you for your time and response,

(toothpick's real name)

peace.

1.19.2005

A frozen eye, an exploding head, and a shiny new gun.

Two mornings in a row I've walked to work and arrived with the lashes on my right eye frozen and tangled. I'm not sure what it is about the right eye. It somehow produces more fluid than the left, or the left is just more protected due to the unwarranted amount of winking it does (see: below, My Goodies, Not My Goodies).

Today I finally finished and printed the first run of my poetry collection. As a side note, I must say, typing the phrase "poetry collection" when referring to something you yourself have made is not the most dignifying thing you can type. I think from now on I shall use the phrase "gun polishing" in its place.

And so, I today finished with my gun polishing. To be honest, I wish my gun were a little shinier, but as far as guns go, it'll get the job done. And to be further honest, I don't know that much about guns. What I've polished could be a gat, a glock, a super soaker, who knows. I just know what works for me. Either way though, I'm looking forward to pointing my shiny new gun at people and seeing what they think of it. Most people don't really like guns, but they'll respect them when they're shiny and pointing back at them.

Speaking of not making sense, we saw Elektra on the weekend. I mean, you go into a movie like that with low expectations anyway. But then you are baffled by the fact it was even worse than that. And then you wonder how they could fuck up a movie that badly, that efficiently and thoroughly. And then you come to the conclusion that movies can't be made that bad by mere accident or misfire. For movies that just happen to be bad are never on that level of badness. This is the next level of badosity. And so you eventually reach the understanding that in order for Elektra to have been this bad, it must have been made this bad on purpose. But then, you tell youself in order to maintain some semblance of a grip on rational reality, why would someone make such a bad, bad, bad film on purpose? Despite being the only logical conclusion, it just wouldn't make sense, would it? You're baffled. And then your brain explodes.

peace.

1.16.2005

It Was Bound to Happen...

There are two things I swore I would never let this blog once again become:

1) An Sbux ranter.
2) An EmoBlog.

And these past few days, what with all the time I've spent at work wanting to slit my wrists and pour purocaff on them, the most I could do to prevent such a regression is not post here at all.

And it's nothing personal. Work, for the most part, is fine. It's just me, going through the stupid motions once again, blah blah blah. And so, I find myself zoning out on people and situations, staring out into space and turning off my brain.

I've become one of those chronically serious people. Stern, dour, lock-jawed and cynical, though every once in awhile breaking out into spontaneous fits of sillyness and laughter. This of course is the source of much confusion, both for myself and those around me.

In short, I've become the characters from Garden State. Which I hated, and so, is not a good thing.

I'd much rather be the characters from House of Flying Daggers. Wearing cool hats, kissing hot blind chicks, throwing big bamboo sticks at people, clashing swords in the midst of this schizophrenic snowfall, walking around dramatically with a big knife in my back.

I'm not sure what that meant, but as I said: brain.turned.off.

And there you have it. First depression post of '05. Believe me, it's a major focus this year to make it the last.

peace.

1.11.2005

Herpes and Pipe Cleaners

I'm not usually one for New Year's resolutions, but people change, and this year I've made more than a couple of them. None of them are anything special, especially the one at the top of my list: get back in shape. So far I've been pretty good with sticking to my workout schedule and diet. Except of course for that time my mom brought home a box of Krispey Kreme donuts and I ate more than half of it. Oh, and yesterday, when my sister asked me if I wanted to go out for a scoop of ice cream and I said "No", and got two instead.

My workouts have been satisfying. As satisfying as jumping in place or picking something up and then putting it back down can be. My metabolism has always been good, and my body used to respond quickly to exercise, so I'm hoping that still stands now that I'm no longer a teenager. When I got my wisdom teeth out the nurse who was running tests on my heart rate asked if I were athlete, at which I laughed and not because of the laughing gas. She told me that despite my lack of current physical activity I have the heart of an athlete. Maybe by athlete she meant someone who wants to make a lot of money doing something that contributes little to the world and who refuses to admit there's something seriously wrong with their back spinal area (I'm fine, really!), but I'm gonna assume, because it makes me feel good, that she meant I have a mutant heart that pumps blood and oxygen like the meatheaded ginos from my highschool now pump gas.

Anyways.

I just got back from work. I was in a shit mood all day, suddenly aware of how much I don't fit in there anymore. But maybe that's just my wildly oscillating sugar-levels speaking, but hey. I feel like I want to quit again, and Krystle all but crushed my dreams of being a professional voice actor for cartoons.

The poetry book is almost done. My sister has been having a grand time making fun of me for "doing crafts". And I'm like "I'm not doing crafts, you yatch. I'm making a zine. And yo, have you seen my gluestick?" To which she laughs and says, "gluestick! He said gluestick!"

Morgan relayed the message that I'm "a big faggot for doing crafts", to which I yelled at the phone against my sister's ear, "It's not crafts and your girlfriend has HERPES!"

My sister clings hard to the fact that the sores on her tongue are not herpes, even though the medicine prescribed to her clearly has the word HERPES on it. And she's probably right, but it's my only defence when I'm caught holding tiny scissors with glue-covered hands, thinking aloud to myself, "I wonder how this would look with pipe cleaners...?"

peace.

1.08.2005

She Also Drooled That Night.

Because we like to spend our evenings and weekends lying on the couch and doing absolutely nothing, Christianne and I have gotten to know each other's bodies quite well. And you can take whatever meaning you want from that (because you are probably correct with your inferences), but what I mean is that we openly fart and burp and, sometimes, drool in front of each other. When you spend huge sections of your day beside another person it becomes difficult, pointless and therefore even undesireable, to exert the necessary effort needed to contain such narsty, natural habits. It's why everyone pisses when swimming and nobody really minds. Because really, you're going to do it yourself as well, and what else are you gonna do, get off the beach and find a toilet?? Yea. Rite. *pshhhhhh*

My girlfriend's body seems prone to many different types of pain, the two most sinister being pains of the stomach and the self-esteem (it's an organ, I swear). Yesterday she was wracked by both, shrinking into the fetal position after running to the bathroom in a possible barf-alert, asking such inane questions of the human condition such as "Do you love me" and "Am I ugly" and "What is the meaning of life" and "Why do you keep watching that Dark Angel shit?"

And when she's like that, you either want to slap her your hardest or hug her your hardest, but either way, you want to break her up into little bits and pieces. And I was all ready to deliever the Speech, the Speech that heals minds, unites nations, inspires astronauts, but as soon as my mouth opened the yatch farted.

The gas she passed must have been laughing gas because she went from despondent to delirious in the second it takes for ass cheeks to flutter open and say "Whassssupp!" This farting-and-laughter back-and-forth continued for much longer than it should have, much like the Nick and Jessica Variety Show, or the career of Chingy.

I then joined in, doing imitations of my girlfriend and loving every second of it. "I am dead to this world..." I would feign, then making a farty-noise with my lips I would fall backwards in hiccupping hilarity.

And sure, it's fun to be sad and then fart and laugh, but oh, it's so much more fun to pretend you are. Because as the Academy teaches us, Meta is so much fun. And as the Schoolyard teaches, farting is the most fun you could have by youself with your own buttcrack. But oh, when you combine the two and multiply by a pair of giggly filipinos on a couch. Oh.

peace.

1.07.2005

My Goodies, Not My Goodies.

A couple of months ago I thought it would be fun to step up my flirting game at work. (Such activity having been sanctioned and approved by my girlfriend.) I started chatting up the female customers, smiling at ones who responded, and every once in awhile, cranking the cheese-ball factor to maximum, I would wink at them.

More of a fun activity than anything else. Until of course this became normal behaviour for me and I found myself smiling and winking at male customers by habitual mistake.

All flirting activities were thus halted and suspended until I were single and desperate, or until singer Ciara decided to drop by Missisauga and order a pumpkin spice latte, in which case I would spray her with Axe cologne and make hungry doggie faces at her (which ever came first).

But then today Bryan and Mona started winking at me and laughing. Addressing my confusion, they explained that I had been winking at customers. Females, males, old Chinese men, thirteen year old white girls, all without even realizing it.

The sad part of it all, though, is not that I have probably been doing this for a long time and am probably known within our customer base as "That Winking/Smiling Guy", but rather, that I have been winking and smiling at these muthafuckers for months now and I've gotten absolutely nothing from it.

Not a smile, not a phone number, and mos definitely, sadly, not even a wink back in return.

*looks in mirror and cries*

peace.

1.06.2005

Work

It's such a pointless cycle. She talking to me as if I were a child, and me of course responding in kind with sarcasm, petulance, blank stares, rudeness. She walking off with eyes rolling, why doesn't he grow up?

**********

Home

I have many reasons to dislike my sister. As children she positioned herself somewhat as Tyrant. She ruled the phone, ate the good crab meat, held sole influence on the television channels; she had the grades, the friends, and therefore the power. And she enjoyed the power, she did. Listening in on phone calls, stealing money, biting me, slapping me, breaking my possessions, taking my things and giving them to her thugged-out boyfriends.

In early highschool she served as my barber. Handy with a shaver and being friends with the blacks and the filipinos, she had a skill for fades. And with the only other choices around being Sal the Barber, who seemed to think fades and bowl-cuts were the same thing, and Tita Norma, who invariably made everyone look exactly the same as her (like a frog with motorcycle helmet), my personal appearance was in her hands. Knowing that personal appearance is important to skinny 9ers with inherently poor sense of style and problems with backne (exactly what you think it is), my sister knew the power that she and her shaver held over me.

In exchange for semi-fly shaves I traded much of my personal dignity and space. Be a sucker at school or at home, and really, there wasn't much of a choice.

But I'm not salty. I've grown much from the stupid shy kid I used to be, and really any authority she used to have over me is now brushed easily away and given the gas face. She's a booger stuck on the back of a couch, such a big deal during childhood, merely an ugly nuissance as an adult. We've since been able to form an approximation of a loving brother/sister relationship.

Nowadays, the most she can hope to do is annoy me. Which, to her credit, God bless her, she's pretty good at. She's sometimes rude to my girlfriend and she keeps talking to me when I'm clearly busy reading or writing something. And just a few days ago, gotdammit, she finished all of my Joy tea. Ten bags in like three days. Which, as far as I know, is an unprecedented average in annoyance.

**********

World

Who knew that organizing a small fund raiser at work for Tsunami victims would prove to be such an annoyance. I can't believe that I am encountering egos while going about this. Why does every day at work have to read like a transcript for The Apprenctice? Especially when dealing with this?

But I should stop complaining and just get shit done.

peace.

1.03.2005

Crisis on Infinite Earths

Every couple of years the X-Men series' get depressing and reflective. Some tragedy hits, the death of Jean, the Legacy Virus, the teams break up and re-arrange and all the characters all of sudden become philosophers.

This is common fare in comic books. Writers get the need to shake things up and so they release some sort of life-changing tragedy on their characters. It's all a cycle though, because in comics the more things change the more things stay the same. No matter what happens, the characters *have* to return to some state of normalcy.

Why? Readers come and go and eventually characters must return to previously established and universally recognized states of "normal" in order for new readers to be able to easily pick up and enjoy a book. In a book that never really ends, there must be some sort of center for new readers to latch on to. No matter how much swinging a book does from it's center, it always returns, tethered to its original continuity.

And so, Superman returns from death, Peter Parker reclaims his rightful position as the real Spiderman, Jean Grey rises from death, Wolverine gets his metal claws back, and the Black Widow sleeps with Daredevil.

What the fuck am I talking about?

New Years has just hit and I feel back where I started, my narrative ready to unroll itself once again. My friends continue to drift, I continue to struggle with whether or not I should be in school, I am once again vowing to get published, get off my ass, make some movies, be a better boyfriend, get in shape, return to martial arts, make a difference in this world, join a temple, write more poetry.

And so, for those who actually read this blog, this is that point in the comic book where I philosophize and get all reflective and that type of bullshit. And then shit starts happening. And then you realize that you've read this before. You might click on the archives and be all "wtf? he wrote this exact same shit last year!"

So instead, I'll spare you of that type of naval-gazing self-indulgence. It's boring and even kinda pathetic, isn't it?

Instead, I'll write some shit about comic books so that I don't feel bad when you think it's boring.

peace.